Legit Cooling Reviews
Noctua NH-D14 HSF Review - The Best CPU Cooler Ever?
| Manufacturer: | Noctua |
| Product: | NH-D14 |
| Date: | Wed, Feb 10, 2010 - 12:00 AM |
| Written By: | Shane Higgins - |
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External Impressions
With the NH-D14 out of the packing we can get a good look at it. This is different from Noctua’s previous dual fan configuration. Instead of twin 120mm fans front and back the NH-D14 has a front mounted 120mm and a center mounted 140mm fan. The cooler is also pretty much assembled; all you have to do is install the SecuFirm mounting system to your motherboard and put the cooler on.
Now, like I said before, the NH-D14 is not massive, but it is big. Here I have the NH-D14 next to a standard 12oz Dr. Pepper can for a little scale. Is bigger better? Guess we will find out together.
Pulling the fans off we can get a better look at the cooler itself. This time around Noctua made the sound reducing silicon strips way beefier than in coolers past. Past strips were 1/8" thick, and used a sticky backing to hold it to the cooler. The new ones are almost 1/2" thick and 1/4" wide, and pressed into the fins. The fins of the NH-D14 are a little thinner than those on the NH-U12P, but still feel very solid. I never felt like I was going to bend a fin.
Looking closer at the top of the cooling fins the profile looks like a saw blade, and if there was a doubt as to who made the cooler, Noctua has their name and owl logo stamped into the fins.
The NH-D14 has a twin tower arrangement with 6 heatpipes, giving 12 vertical pipes for dissipating heat. With the large amount of surface area of the fins, along with the dual fans and 6 heatpipes, the NH-D14 should do very well.
The base of the NH-D14 doesn't have a perfect finish, but neither did the NH-U12P. Here we can also see the pre-installed mounting tabs.
Next Page - The NF-P14 Fan
| Review Index |
|
Page 1 - The Massive Noctua NH-D14
Page 2 - External Impressions Page 3 - The NF-P14 Fan Page 4 - Installing the NH-D14 Page 5 - The Legit Reviews Core i7 Test System Page 6 - Results Page 7 - Final Thoughts |
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